


Enjoy

by gondalsqueen



Category: Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, shower scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-04
Updated: 2016-02-04
Packaged: 2018-05-18 06:39:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5902222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gondalsqueen/pseuds/gondalsqueen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Kanan’s holding her head with one hand and soaping a lek with the other when he realizes that he’s never had this experience with any other lover." </p><p>Some thoughts on intimacy and caretaking set after "The Protector of Concord Dawn."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Enjoy

It’s one of those small steps celebration days. The internal injuries haven’t healed yet, though she no longer coughs up blood every time she lies on her side. And bacta and synthskin have done a fantastic job on the surface, so she can go without the bandages for short periods of time, as long as they’re careful. Wounds closed, she can even have a shower in real water.

Real. Water. After all those sponge baths. Hera considers it a gigantic leap forward.

They take her to the Ghost to shower because that’s what she wants “more than anything in the world,” and for all her directness, Hera Syndulla is a master of playing on the emotions. (“You’re going right back to the med bay after this,” Kanan informs her, and she takes one look at the stone lines of his face and doesn’t even try giving him Those Eyes.)

Still, they need the stool crammed into the fresher’s tiny cubicle, and sitting is about all she can do for herself. No. That’s not quite true. She can tilt her head back and enjoy the warm water running over her face and down her lekku with a closed-eyes expression that reminds Kanan of other times. And she can over-lather certain areas herself, mostly the areas he’d really like to help her wash.

But those are reflex thoughts. Kanan doesn’t spend much energy lusting after the muscles and curves of her body today—he’s still far too intent on making things better. So he massages her calves (which are mostly undamaged), then her feet, then her shoulders. “I want soap on every square centimeter of skin,” Hera declares imperiously. She’s all smug smiles and sighs. That part is for him, her satisfaction a thank you for everything he’s doing. (She also took a hefty dose of pain medication to help her get down the halls, and that certainly doesn’t hurt the experience.)

Kanan’s holding her head with one hand and soaping a lek with the other when he realizes that he’s never had this experience with any other lover. Sure, he’s passed time with all sorts of sentients, in all sorts of positions, and in dozens of really questionable scenarios. Some of those he hasn’t even replicated with Hera (and thinking back on a few really sketchy nights, he’s profoundly okay with the omissions). But he’s never helped anyone else wash. Not out of necessity, not to show affection, not even just for the fun of it.

He angles the nozzle and rinses her head clean, and Hera nuzzles back into his hand. Nakedness implies intimacy. Well, that or sex. Her body still looks like a child’s fingerpainting—sex is off the menu for a good long while.

Kanan runs his arm down her back for support and gets to work on her neck. She sidles tchun, the less damaged lek, against it. The whole situation is profoundly intimate.

And that’s the reason he avoided anything like this for years. Once Kanan’s committed, he’s all in.  He’ll do whatever it takes to keep her.

Except that after seven years of Hera’s influence, he has internalized some of her thought patterns and her goals. He’s willing to stick to his guns and make her unhappy if it helps fix things in the long run. And he’ll even live without her, if he has to. If that loss helps her get what she wants.

But that’s not the plan.

She’s clean. “Finished?” he asks.

Hera makes no apologies. “Not yet.”


End file.
